Tucson

We had an enjoyable trip to Tucson this week, got the truck tuned up and did some shopping. Two nights were spent at the Comfort Suites near the Tucson Mall. Monday we drove over from Organ Pipe, took care of the truck, went to the mall and wound up getting lost looking for a pizza dinner.
Tuesday was a great day!! The daylight hours were spent at the fantastic Arizona-Sonoran Desert Museum. The private museum is in the foothills just west of Tucson. We were greeted by a docent holding an owl.

Early in the day we were treated to the flying raptors show. The birds fly free and are lured in by the trainers putting pieces of meat in the trees. It is hard to get a good photo of a flying bird at a low level.

The park overlooks the Tohono O'Odham reservation to the west.

Well, I could bore everyone with zoo pictures and I don't want to but I do want to post a couple of neat photos of the bobcat and mountain lion. So here:

Tuesday night we had dinner at the Arizona Inn. A very swanky place which we probably would not have gone to on our own; however we had a gift certificate thanks to some of the Gift Shop employees at the North Rim. The food was a 9.5, unfortunately service was a 3. I think our server was just learning.
Wednesday we drove back to Organ Pipe and stopped at the Desert Rain Cafe in Sells on the Tohono O'Odham reservation. Very good and different food, the O'Odham are trying to get their members to return to native-traditional foods rather than processed foods. 60-70% of the tribal members have diabetes. Sherri and I had the appetizer sampler which had desert hummus, tepary bean dip and cholla bud salsa. For the main course we split a tepary bean chicken quesadilla. We washed it all down with agave ice tea. The lunch was good and very interesting.
Back in Organ Pipe on Thursday, Steve a seasonal ranger, and I combined our programs for the folks in the town of Ajo. 55 people showed up for our mining/ranching program in the plaza. I thought the turnout was small but Sue, the head of interpretation, was pleased with the numbers. Tonight I have my program in the park's amphitheater and 75-100 will be in attendance.
I'll leave this week with a photo of the beautiful Sherri at the museum. Ya'all come back next week.

Ajo and Grass Canyon

Tuesday Sherri and I went shopping and for a Valentine's Day lunch in Ajo. I have not posted pictures of the quaint town, there are some very nice areas. Below is a picture of the Catholic Church taken from across the plaza. Looking the other way is the old train station, which is now shops.

The only spot I could get a picture of the old copper mine was into the sun.The copper mine is no longer in operation. Even with the high price of copper the percentage of ore in the rock is not sufficient to reopen the mine, so Ajo is stuck with a large hole. Turning 90 deg. is the Indian Catholic Church, which is now a museum.

We had a good lunch at a Mexican restaurant, being from Albuquerque we are rather snobbish about Mexican food. So, lunch was good not great :)
Wednesday was a hike day for the boys. Brian, Jim and I set at 7:30am to hike up and over Grass Canyon, down the north fork of Alamo Canyon.

The hike is a loop, to cut off a couple of miles at the end Hilda dropped us off and took the picture. We left my truck at the Alamo Campground. The first picture is Montezuma's Head, where the author Ed Abbey wrote about climbing to the top one drunken evening. The next picture is looking up into Grass Canyon and the saddle, over the top.

We hiked up and over and the view on the other side was beautiful.

This entire hike is not on a trail so bushwhacking through the sage and cacti gets mentally tiring. This shows how steep it is to reach the wash. It was nice to reach the wash where climbing up and over boulders was tough but easier than bushwhacking.

 
It had rained a 1/3 of an inch Tuesday morning so the tinajas are full of water and algae.

It was a great hike where we didn't see another person all day. After almost eight hours of bushwhacking and climbing over boulders we were glad to reach my truck. We will have to do it again soon.
This week Sherri and I are heading off to Tucson for three days/two nights to shop, eat, service the truck and look for RV parts. I have been asked to give my evening program in the Ajo plaza on Thursday evening, there will be an ad in this weeks Copper Mountain News. I don't know if there will be 25 or 250 people who will come and watch. I am looking forward to giving my program in the historic plaza.
We had more rain on Thursday(rain is always welcome in the desert)and this morning we had fog, which doesn't happen very often. It made for a neat picture.

Quitobaquito

This week we had a large group of Escapees RV Club members staying in the campground. The group of 110 was staging here before they headed down to Puerto Penasco. They were going to be here Tuesday - Thursday and we have evening programs scheduled Friday - Sunday.  So, I volunteered to present my program on Wednesday night and we wound up with a record crowd of 134. It was fun presenting a program to a large enthusiastic crowd.
Thursday was a special day for the volunteers. Escorted by M-16 carrying law enforcement, we went out to a part of the park closed to the public. The springs at Quitobaquito were made into a pond in the late 1800's and through the efforts of Natural Resources the ponds are doing well. The pond is home to over 10,000 pupfish which are on the endangered species list.
Most of the 15 mile drive is right on the border and is extremely bumpy. In some places Mexican Highway 2 is very close. The fence is the vehicle barrier just inside the border line.

 The group arriving at Quito.

The pond is unusual in the middle of the desert. It was a very welcome sight to those crossing the desert on their way to California.

We strolled around the pond and took in as much knowledge as possible from a full-time Interpreter and a biologist from Natural Resources. We are going to have 10 tours open to the public starting in a few weeks, and since I will be leading a couple of them, I need to study and research. I'll leave you this week with a couple more photos of the Quitobaquito area, the grave marker is the only non Native American buried in the area. In the photo immediately below we are looking at the point where the water comes out of the hillside.

Evening Program

This past Saturday I gave my second evening program on the ranching history in Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument. It is a 45 minute talk with some slides, given from the perspective of a member of the Gray family who dominated cattle ranching in the monument. I talk with a western twang for the entire program and reviews have been good :)

With three different program preps complete, we are able to do some different activities on our days off. A week ago we went up to the annual RV show in Quartzsite. We left on Tuesday and spent the night. It is a crazy place. In short summary, it is a flea market for miles, not our cup of tea. I didn't even take a picture.
This past Wednesday we were able to get out for a hike. We left early from Alamo Canyon with the goal of hiking through Grass Canyon and up over a ridge. The hike from Alamo to the canyon was up and down through washes and around boulders.

I took us longer than expected to arrive at the entrance to Grass Canyon, so Brian, Hilda, Sherri and I decided to change course as we did not want to be coming down a mountainside in the dark. As we arrived at the entrance to Grass Canyon, Brian was being one with nature. The wildflowers are a beautiful carpet this winter.

We changed course and hiked over to Copper Mountain. This mountain saw extensive mining and is littered with many holes.

Sherri is thrilled to be holding this copper filled rock. We enjoyed some lunch at the base of the hill.

Brian and I hiked over the mountain, while Sherri and Hilda walked around. The Park Service dynamited some of the holes for safety. Inadvertently, this has created an excellent habitat for the endangered Lesser Long Nosed Bat. In the summer Organ Pipe hosts the largest maternal colony of this bat, who feasts on the fruit of the saguaro and Organ Pipe. An entrance to the mine.

From here we hiked back to the car passing through some large and interesting chain fruit (jumping) chollas. Sherri says they look like Dr. Seuss trees.

It was a good eight mile bushwhack through the desert. It is more tiring than hiking on a trail, but we also saw things few others will ever see.

Sonoyta

Busy getting ready for tonights 45 minute evening program. We haven't hiked or done too much for the past couple of weeks. I think I'm ready for tonight, I'm sure we will have photos to post soon. Sherri did get a couple of photos of me conducting the Ajo Mountain Van Tour, ten visitors on a three hour tour.

On our day off last week we did go down to Sonoyta, Mexico for dinner. Sherri and I went down early with Brian and Hilda. We walked around for awhile to check out the sights. Here we are on the Plaza.

The church is undergoing a facelift and had a service going on inside, so we didn't get to see all of it in its full glory. Here are Sherri and I on a cholla skeleton love seat.

 The bell tower under renovation.

 The Priest's house and offices.

We met 12 other volunteers for dinner at Zarape's, an open air restaurant. Janet, in the white vest, works at the Monument's Visitor Center and is a citizen of both Mexico and US. Janet was our host.

 It was Jimmy's birthday so Janet ordered cake and balloons. Sherri with "Mini Maus", close enough for a Mexican street vendor.

We had a great time and ate some wonderful Mexican Food. We are planning trips to Sonoyta every couple of weeks.

Pronghorn and More

Monday Sherri and I set off to finish a hike we attempted after we first arrived at Organ Pipe. The weather was much better this past Monday than the first time we tried to hike to the arches. Our goal is to reach the top of the arches.

Coming up the back side of this ridge is very steep and a lot of loose rock. We did make it up to the top, just to the right of the moon. Sherri is coming straight up.

Great views at the top; the road and parking lot are below.

Just down the road from the arches an employee had told me where to find petroglyphs, so Sherri and I took another hike and found the rock art. Pretty Cool!!

Tuesday morning I was a late addition going out to Bates Well to put the pronghorn fence back up. It was taken down last week to release five males. Two Natural Resources employees, Amy and Ed, are trying to find the released males on radar. 

To get to Bates Well we went through an area closed to the public, there is an old ranch house along the road. Armenta Ranch is on the northern edge of the monument.

The pronghorn enclosure is in an open area and not much to look at. We put the 300' of fence back up in a couple of hours and took a tour of the ranch at Bates Well. This house is the last occupied "private residence" on the monument. Bobby Gray lived here until 1976.

Wednesday brought another hike up the old road between Ajo and Sonoyta, Mexico with a couple of other interps, Brian and Hilda.

The hike is a mainly flat nine miles. There is a very interesting Christate on a saguaro cactus, we all thought it looked like a camel.

Thursday was a big day. We were up at 3:30am to drive with three other volunteers to the 640ac breeding pen for pronghorn. A few years ago there were only 22 Sonoran Pronghorn in existance, today the numbers are up to 250, but still very much an endangered species. Five males had been transfered to Bates Well pens and released. Today the hope was to transfer up to eight pregnant females to Bates Well. This is accomplished by first herding the pronghorn into holding pens, called bomas. Then the pronghorn to be transferred are sectioned off in the boma. To capture the pronghorn eight people holding a net go into the boma and the pronghorn is wrestled to the ground and the veterinarian gives the pronghorn a shot of anesthesia. The pronghorn then is brought out on a stretcher and is processed.

The big concern is the pronghorn overheat from stress. The vet closely monitors the animal while water is poured on the pronghorn, that is why we started at dawn. From the processing station the pronghorn are loaded on the back of a pickup and driven to the helicopter a half mile down the road. Here is Sherri holding the IV bag getting ready to go to the helicopter, the man in the hoodie holding the pronghorn's head is Lee Baiza, superintendent of Organ Pipe.

It is an incredible operation which we felt very honored to be a part of, unfortunately two of the four died before being transported....very sad. The thought was a change in the anesthesia cocktail was causing the problem. Friday they were able to transport four more successfully, so the hope is six pregnant pronghorns can be released into the wild. We will be involved some more in this program when we go out to Bates Well again to monitor the released animals.
The interpretive programs started today and Thursday is the start of our presentations; it is almost show time so we better be ready.